Missing plane's wheel found on Marin beach

Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, February 15, 1995

A wheel from a small plane missing from the San Carlos airport since last weekend has washed up on a Marin County beach, leading authorities to believe the Cessna crashed at sea.

The wheel was found at about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday in Rodeo Cove just north of the Marin Headlands, said Lt. Col. Sydney Wolfe of the Civil Air Patrol in Santa Clara. A check confirmed that it was from the Cessna 182 that took off Sunday morning from the San Carlos airport.

A search for the plane, which involved 11 planes and a 30-member ground crew, was called off Tuesday, Wolfe said. The case has been turned over to the National Transportation Safety Board.

The Cessna left for what was to have been a two-hour flight at 9:32 a.m. Sunday from the San Carlos airport and has not been seen since. The plane was rented from the San Carlos Flight Center, a rental and training center at the airport, and was supposed to return there. The center did not return phone calls Tuesday night.

The plane, which was reported missing by concerned family members of the pilot, last was seen near San Gregorio Beach south of Half Moon Bay, Wolfe said.

Authorities are still not sure exactly who was on board.

"We have not been able to confirm that there were two or three people on board," Wolfe said. "We only know the name of one - the pilot." His name has not been released.

The man had apparently just finished working an overnight shift at a San Francisco engineering firm, Wolfe said. The pilot told a family member he was taking two friends on a flight out of the San Carlos airport, but investigators have no way of telling whether two passengers got aboard, Wolfe said.&lt;